Over 5 thousand Almaty public vehicles will drive on natural gas, KTK reports. Besides, two new gas filling stations are to be opened in 2011.

Ambulance cars and garbage trucks will be the first to switch to gas. There are already 200 buses that drive on gas in Almaty. “If calculating the cost per kilometer in our bus fleet, it is 19 tenge when using gas. It is 25 tenge when using petrol and 27 tenge per liter for diesel fuel,” head of Almaty Department of Natural Resources and Regulation of Natural Use Altai Rakhimbetov.

Meanwhile, city administration is planning to give loans to citizens for modifying their cars to switch to gas.

Almost all public vehicles of Argentina, Brazil and Pakistan have already switched to gas fuel.